Page 48 of Italian’s Christmas Acquisition

She wasn’t just the only woman available at the top of a snowed-in mountain. There had been beautiful women all over that gala. He was impatient to leave with her.

She needed to hear him say that.

Because she wanted... Something intense. Something reckless tonight. She felt like when she had slipped this dress on she had put on new skin with it. Like perhaps she had uncovered new depths to herself, new layers.

Like she wasn’t just Noelle, with the Christmas tree farm and the bed-and-breakfast. Unassuming and sweet.

Trying to hold together the warm, glowing images of her childhood.

Wholesome. That was what she had always been. Trying to maintain this air of wholesomeness, essentially, as she clung to a two-dimensional vision of her past.

Of her parents.

She had kept herself simple because she resented the complexity of her mother.

That was a stunning realization.

And yet, not one she needed to deal with just at the moment. What she really needed was him.

“Do you want me, Rocco?”

“Yes,” he growled.

“I don’t mean opportunistically. I don’t mean because I’m the woman who you decided to marry for your own convenience. I don’t mean... You know, how I pointed out to you that people are nice to you because you have power over them. I don’t want you to want me simply because this arrangement gave power to you. Or because we were stuck on a mountaintop.”

“I could not even see the faces of the other women there. I could not track the shapes of their bodies. They were brightly colored orbs, orbiting around you. They meant nothing to me. No memory of sex means anything to me. Only the reality of you. You are correct, I am a man with exceeding power. I have trapped you with me, haven’t I? Because of that, I do not have to give you my fidelity, do I? I could have left with one of those women. What would you have said? What would you do?”

“I would be hurt,” she said.

“And that would only matter to me if I cared about your feelings. My point is, nothing is stopping me from taking another woman if I want her. But I do not. I want you.”

That was what she needed to hear. She closed the distance between them, crossed the space, and claimed his mouth. She kissed him deep and long, as she had wanted to do all day, but had felt so disoriented, she simply hadn’t. Or perhaps she had been protecting herself. But not anymore.

He was starving. She could feel it in every line of his body. The growl that exited his mouth, even though he was bound and determined to pretend that he was not feral for her.

He was.

She was.

They arrived at the penthouse too fast and too slow. And she moved away from him reluctantly, allowing him to take her hand and lead her out of the car.

She was covered by her coat. It felt cumbersome. Like too many layers, when she wanted to be naked against him.

What a strange thing to know exactly what she wanted. To be in this strange place, in a new situation, and yet to know this.

It was like an anchor, holding her fast to the earth.

What a glorious thing.

The trip up to the apartment was a blur. And when they entered, he pulled her hard against him, kissing her deep, letting her feel that iron hardness of his body, letting her feel exactly what she did to him.

He pushed the coat off her shoulders, as she began to loosen his tie.

They moved, in synchronous rhythm, to that expansive black couch.

They stood at the edge of it, her back to the window, and he began to untie the straps that held the dress to her body.

It fell away, leaving her naked except for the red high heels she was wearing. She hadn’t put any underwear on beneath the dress because it simply hadn’t allowed for it. The fabric was to slippery and silky. And now she was grateful for it, because the look on his face was... That was a look that she wanted to pursue. Not just now, but maybe forever.

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